This year, there were some exciting invitations offered by colleges. Offers from Yale (Guadalupe De La Rosa), Berkeley (Winnie Xin), Georgetown (Florence Kong), Duke (Shane Cashin), and Vanderbilt (Ted Kern) included.

 

Clark High School students have often been known to receive offers from the most exclusive colleges. Last year, Joseph Maalouf accepted admission to Stanford University and Sharon Fang accepted admission to Duke University.

 

But there’s more to selecting a University than just its name. Seniors had to also weigh location, financial aid, climate (especially those colleges who seem to freeze during the winter), size, scholarships, and programs offered.

 

Florence Kong, who will be attending Georgetown University this fall, explains that the “college selection process was not easy for her.”

 

At first, when Kong’s letter arrived from Georgetown, it was not a usual admission packet like other universities. “As I got a small envelope from Georgetown, I knew it was a rejection letter,” Kong recalls. However, it was actually an admission letter.

 

So the moral of the story is don’t judge a college admission letter by the size it comes in.

 

But Kong primarily chose Georgetown over other universities “because of its location. Washington D.C. is a place with a plethora of internships,” Kong explains.

 

Kong continues, ”I’m really grateful and consider myself lucky to be able to attend such an amazing university as Georgetown to become a finance major.”

 

In addition, Marcos Lu Wang, is attending the Ivy League Cornell University this fall “because of the university's excellent liberal arts education in a large campus setting with a variety of extracurricular opportunities available.”

 

Lu Wang plans to study cellular biology or economics later this year.

 

Shane Cashin initially accepted admission to Northwestern University on May 1st. However, later that day, he got off the waiting list for Duke University and accepted. Cashin also had offers from Vanderbilt, University of Arizona, and University of Virginia on the table.

 

Cashin chose to accept Duke because he wanted “to receive a top-tier education and have a great social environment at the same time. Duke provided the best of both worlds with an unbelieveable campus, outstanding sports program, decent weather (especially when compared to Northwestern), prime location, and the flexibility to pursue more than single subject.”

 

Cashin is currently an undecided major who has plans to pursue business, political science, or engineering.

 

Furthermore, although Theodore Kern received a full scholarship upon special decision to Vanderbilt University, Kern will attend Carnegie Mellon University “because he loves robots and a National Robotics Institute is on campus.”

 

Kern plans to study Electrical and Computer Engineering.

 

Despite students choosing colleges upon different factors, each senior found unique qualities among their excellent colleges.

 

Florence Kong based her decision primarily upon location whereas Marcos Lu Wang focused on the various majors offered. In addition, Shane Cashin focused on location and campus opportunities whereas Kern based his decision upon institutes within the college.

 

Congratulations to all the seniors for graduating and moving on to college or other ambitions!